A long time ago there lived in the mountains a man named Diskhi, who was famous for his art of building tall towers. In one of the auls of the Akki Gorge Diskhi married a maiden. Once in spring, when it is easiest to get sheepskins from young sheep in the mountains, Diskhi asked his bride to prepare sheepskins and make him a coat.

The bride promised to fulfill the bridegroom's request, but she was very sluggish: the summer was coming to an end, cold mornings were beginning, and the coat was still missing. The groom inquired whether his errand had been fulfilled, and to his great dismay he was convinced of his bride's utter negligence; it turned out that the sheepskins had not yet been finally dressed. Wishing to express as much indignation as possible for such inattention to his request, Diskhi became indignant and, in order to teach his bride a lesson, said that he himself would prepare everything necessary and build a high tower sooner than the coat was ready.

From words came to deeds: Diskhi began to prepare the stones, and then he soon began to build the walls. Naturally, Diskhi was in a great hurry, so that he could prove the truth of his words before his bride. The walls were already finished, stone slabs were piled on the high scaffolding; it was left to make the roof of them, as suddenly the logs of the scaffolding broke under the exorbitant weight of the stone and.... Diskhi fell from a height of five feet with the material with which he was killed.

The bride came running to the alarm and seeing the disfigured corpse of her bridegroom, threw herself on the dagger beside him and also fell dead. The famous master died, and the fatal tower is still called Diskhi-woo.

As part of the work plan, employees of the Jeirakh-Assinsk Museum-Reserve are holding preventive talks with schoolchildren about developing a careful attitude to the republic's historical and cultural monuments.

A little higher than where the Armkhi River flows into the Terek, at the intersection of the Daryal and Jeyrakhov gorges, at the end of the last century a graceful 5-story watchtower with a rectangular base, flat roof and high parapet stood on a rock. It reached a height of 23.00 meters. Here armed warriors of the surrounding tower settlements alternately performed guard duty, controlling the vital trade and transportation highway. And as soon as enemies appeared in the Daryal Gorge, the guards would light a fire on the tower, and the rising smoke would let people know about the approaching danger. Now only separate stone blocks of the base of the tower have been preserved.

The substantial folklore and ethnographic information about it was collected by N.F. Ustvolskaya, and later by I.A. Dakhkilgov and D.Y. Chakhkiev.

And here is what is written about this tower in Ingush legend.

Not far from this watchtower, where Ezminskoye Lake is now, there was a strong fortress where many people lived. There was also a large army in that fortress.

Once an untold army of steppe warriors appeared in the gorge. The watchtower was alerted to the approaching danger. The men of authority decided that the people of the fortress must either defeat the enemy or perish. And they also decided: “If it happens that all our warriors die and the enemy wins, women should throw themselves and their children into the abyss, and girls should marry into the fire.

- And what should we who have lost our strength do? - asked the decrepit old men.

- You must pass around a bowl of poison,” they were told, ”drink it while making toasts.

The battle began. The fighters didn't know day or night. The children burned large pine beams at night so that they could see their enemies better. The battle was so bloody that the bodies of the enemies flooded the Terek and it went out of its banks. None of the defenders of the fortress survived.

All women and children threw themselves into the abyss and perished at its bottom. The old men sat in a circle and drank a bowl of poison. The girls made a big fire, chose Myalha Azu and started throwing themselves into the fire. Jumping into the fire the girls said that they were marrying him.

The remaining enemies destroyed all their towers to the ground. Of the inhabitants, no one was left alive.

(N.D. Kodzoev, R.H. Buzurtanov. Tales of the Caucasus).

The mountain “Myat-Loam” is indigenous to Ingushetia and literally translates from Ingush as “motherland mountain” or fatherland mountain. According to linguistic and ethnographic studies, the word “Myat” means motherland, and loam means mountain. And the name table appeared because the mountain belongs to the category of rocks with flat tops resembling a table.

Mait-Loam is a symbol of Ingushetia, it is depicted on the coat of arms of the Republic of Ingushetia, to the left of the combat tower.

Mait-Loam is the only peak in the whole world on which three shrines are consecutively located. Two more shrines located on its summit, “Suson Dyala” - the patron saint of noble women, was destroyed in 1925 and “Myater Dyala” - the throne of the gods, also has not survived to this day.

Myat-Loam - is the patron saint of agriculture and fertility, in whose honor the temple of Myat-seli was built.

Myat-Seli - a monument of history and culture of federal significance - bears the name of the mountain “Maьt” and not vice versa, because on its top there are other sanctuaries, the names of which are not borrowed from any topographical names.

The “Mait-Seli” temple had the significance of one of the most important Ingush patrons. In the Middle Ages, our ancestors believed that the sanctuaries of “Tamyzh-Yerda”, “Amgali-Yerda”, and Myat-Seli were siblings, of which Myat-Seli was the eldest.

One of the last priests who performed ritual prayers on the Table Mountain was Elmurza Mehdiyev from the village of Falkhan. He is also mentioned by I. Bazorkin in his novel-epic “From the Darkness of Ages”.

The rites around the sanctuary were completed by the end of the 19th century, due to the mass adoption of Islam by the Ingush.

Every year, since 2008, the Ministry of Foreign Relations, National Policy, Press and Information, as part of respect for the traditions and culture of our ancestors, has been organizing ascents to Table Mountain.

On the southern slope of the mountain there are cave-type rock structures. All the structures will be included in the list of historical and cultural monuments of Ingushetia with official names.

In the vicinity of the village of Morch, one can find the foundation stones of the eighteenth-century core-shaped mausoleum Yarych-Kash (Yarych's Grave), built over the grave of a brave leader of the local military detachment named Yarych.

In 1944 the mausoleum was destroyed. Folk memory preserves narratives (Anthology of Ingush folklore. Vol. 7. Ingush legends) associated with this hero, in particular, emphasizing his courage: "Yerezhev Yarazh stood at a post and guarded people from the attack of robbers, who usually captured and sold people. When Yerezhev Yarazh stood on the post, people slept peacefully, because they knew that he was vigilantly guarding them. When it was time for Yarazh to leave his post and rest at home, seven men were put on guard duty instead of him, because he was such a remarkable man.

On the territory of the tower complex “Tiarsh” revealed previously unaccounted for monuments of architecture.

These days the staff of the museum-reserve, within the framework of the plan of works on revealing and accounting of previously unaccounted architectural monuments, on the territory of the tower complex “Tiarsh” revealed an early unaccounted early Muslim cemetery with 9 steles.

Ta'rsh is a large tower village of castle type, located on the spur of the Ma't Loam mountain, 0.9 km east of the “Egenta” complex.

The staff of the institution took measurements of the objects and made photo-fixation. The height of steles is from 30 to 50 cm, the distance between them is from 1 to 3 meters. After the relevant works, the objects will be included in the list of identified objects of cultural heritage of the Republic.

Acting Director of the State Cultural Institution “Jeirakh-Assinsk Museum-Reserve” A.A. Sampiev took part in a videoconference meeting held in the Ministry of Culture of Russia on the disposal of objects of cultural heritage included in the treasury of the Russian Federation, which are in unsatisfactory condition, including objects located in the territory of the Republic of Ingushetia, namely 859 ancestral towers, transferred to the free use of SCU RI “Jeyrakhsko-Assinsky Museum-Reserve”.

The event was held in pursuance of the instruction of the Government of the Russian Federation from July 27, 2024 № MM-P 14-24263 on the inventory of federal property in unsatisfactory condition.

Head of the Territorial Department of the Federal Agency for State Property Management in the Republic of Ingushetia M.A. Gagiev, Head of the Committee for State Protection of Cultural Heritage T.U. Kodzoev also participated in the meeting on behalf of our republic.

Mountainous Ingushetia never ceases to amaze us with its discoveries and its mystery. As we noted earlier, there are over 3,000 cultural heritage sites in the territory of the Jeirakhsky district, which are officially registered and included in the list of identified cultural heritage sites of the Republic of Ingushetia. We also have photographs of these objects in our database.

Almost every day our employees working in the mountainous terrain discover new objects that are absent from our lists.

Not so long ago we started a comprehensive work on inventory of antiquity monuments, and it should be noted, the effectiveness and fruitfulness of this work: only last year inspectors of the museum-reserve was found more than 200 OCN, which are not registered.

Separate work was carried out on crypts with memorial chambers, crypts of rare type, towers, sanctuaries and core mausoleums. These objects were monitored and acts of their technical condition were drawn up.

As a result of the last round, the head of the department for the preservation of monuments, Zyaudin Gurazhev, discovered a sanctuary with a memorial chamber, popularly called ts1uv, on the territory of the tower complex “Niy”.

The object is strongly destroyed, its safety is 25-30 %. As at all similar sanctuaries, the entrance to a memorial chamber is from the southern side, it is half-destroyed. The roof is not preserved, usually such kinds of buildings had a gable-stepped roof. The more preserved part of the object is the first tier, intended for the burial of the dead. The sanctuary is located in the northwestern part of the complex, at a distance of 4 meters from the dwelling tower, next to a small stream.

The object will be entered into the database of the institution and included in the list of identified objects of cultural heritage of the Republic of Ingushetia.

Today, as part of the All-Russian Subbotnik, employees of the Jeyrakh-Assinsk Museum-Reserve and the Committee for State Protection of Cultural Heritage Sites carried out sanitary measures to clean the adjacent territory of the office building in Magas city, and a subbotnik was carried out in the mountainous area.

Employees of the institutions trimmed trees, worked to control unwanted vegetation, collected and removed garbage from the territories.

We hope that our small contribution to the common cause of improvement and cleaning of adjacent territories will improve the condition of our region.